winter imagination: those things that can't be seen

Friday, January 30, 2014; 2:41 p.m. 

Today, I have decided to share my spot. With this dude, Noah, my five-year-old bearded collie.

He is quick and energetic, walks in anything but a line. He's curious about everything he can reach and even things he can't.

It is warm today, 38-degrees right now. It feels a bit like spring, though I see my breath as I write. I don't need gloves. I feel the sun on me today for the first time in weeks. I hear a plane overheard and more birds than normal: short, shrill, wispy calls. Here, then gone. Perhaps their small throats have thawed since last week.

The snow is still here but it feels different. It has lost a bit of its novelty, its brightness, its glow. Perhaps because it's warmer, too, the snow isn't as miraculous--out of place, even. It exists in this warmish day as a memory of something that was once good. It is cold-stiffened, thicker, crunchier, less forgiving to the step.

I almost slid down the stairs from its solid slickness a few minutes ago, holding onto the railing as Noah pulled me along.

I follow behind Noah as he sniffs, learns this place he's never been. I think about the nose as a pair of eyes, as a brain. How he takes in so much information that way. What could that possibly be like? Sometimes, we humans follow our noses. Away from gas or fire, towards chocolate cake or flowers. But to read the world that way, to know histories through the nose is something I have absolutely no concept for.

So today, as I brush new snow off my rock, I think about the things that can't be seen. The smells, of course, but also those things that are hidden from view.

For instance:
How many bugs lie under the rock I sit on?
How close is the nearest rabbit den?
Where are the snakes of the forest curled up?
How many birds would I see if I truly looked 360-degrees around me?
What is the moisture of the snow giving life to that I have no idea about?
How many miles below me is the closest drop of magma?
What is inside Noah's heart?
Has the air I breathe with this inhalation ever been in Norway?
How many ticks crawl the bark of the tree right behind me?
How many forgotten acorns are slowly becoming oak trees in my presence?
How many years has this rock seen? Did a woolly mammoth ever lick its side? How many dogs have lifted their legs on it?
Is there clay beneath lying-down Noah right now? Or only rich soil?
How far down does the snow seep? To the center of the earth? Or does it spread and dry up?
Is the water of the frozen stream sweet or salty? Smooth or silty?
How long are the birch tree's roots?
How does the forest breathe, grow, prosper around and below me in ways I don't even know to ask about?

evidence of humans on the frozen stream

There are still only outlines, traces of my place. In the spring, there will be an abundance, a surplus of all that's here. There will be less barrenness, more complication, more color. We may know more then. Winter is the question. The answer is in the thaw. But winter is the season of imagination. We must connect the dots, fill in the blanks of life as it is happening around us. We are not given so much to work with as the earth curls up, shrinks, retreats for survival. Winter is minimalism at its finest.

I see birds playing in the tree overhead through the inky, thin branches. In the summertime, the leaves would have hidden this from me. I would have heard the birds playing but been unable to witness their fluttering bodies. So, winter reveals as well. Reveals our fortitude, our patience with the snow and the cold, our ability to take in what seems like nothing, what seems like less and to accept that, to see what it provides instead of what it has taken away.

I watch Noah in a new way. I try to picture him as a wild animal, though I know he's not. But some part of him, yes, is wild. He relies on me for food and water and warmth and shelter. But in the forest right now, I am not sure which one of us would actually survive for longer if we were forced to live off the land. I feel a bit inadequate next to him. He takes on the slick snow and stairs with such grace and ease. I trudge behind him trying to keep up. If a predator were behind us, he would take off and escape and I would be food. He takes the cold much better than I do. His fur protects him. The pads of his feet allow him to climb surfaces my unreliable shoes would cause me to slip on. He can smell danger, fear, threats. I can only hear and see them, for the most part.

Noah tries out the rock

So today I try to understand my spot from a new perspective: through smell. I try to be Noah, I try to learn what I can through my nose. I close my eyes, try to shut off my ears. I smell still air tinged with metal. I smell the sweet, damp yarn of my scarf. I smell the chalkiness of drying snow. I smell the matte emptiness of hollow winter breathing. I wonder further what Noah smells, how far back the history in his nose goes. Does he know how many people have wept here? How many have fallen? How many squirrels have chased? How many raindrops have hit, scattered, vanished?

On the way out of the forest, as we climb the last set of stairs, I see movement to my right. I catch it for one second, a rabbit perhaps, bouncing along quickly in a thin, dark blur. But then it disappears. I don't know where it's gone. I cannot discern which path it's taken. I stare, hoping it will appear again, but it never does and I am left still wondering about those things that can't be seen.